Rodeo Christmas at Evergreen Ranch (Gold Valley #13)(75)

“Get some sleep.”

“Tomorrow’s Christmas,” she said.

“Yeah,” he said. “It is.” And she couldn’t puzzle out quite what he meant by that. She knew what she’d meant.

She’d meant stay with her. Sleep with her. But he was leaving, and she wasn’t brave enough to ask.

And when the door closed behind him, all she could think was that sex was some kind of insane witchcraft. Because she wasn’t afraid of a bucking bronco, but she was afraid to ask a man to stay in bed with her. To sleep with her. And what kind of stupid thing was that? She had felt so powerful only a few moments earlier, and now she felt... Now she felt weak and sad.

And she refused to let those words in her mind take shape. She refused. Because this hurt. But she acknowledged the full depth of what she felt—that she might break entirely.





CHAPTER EIGHTEEN


IT WAS CHRISTMAS fucking morning. He woke up feeling like he had a bad hangover. He had fallen asleep on top of his blankets, bare-ass naked, and he was freezing cold. But he supposed it was what he deserved, and no less. And he knew that they had to go over to the main house for their Christmas morning, knew that he had to face her.

He also knew that she hadn’t been happy that he’d left her in the bed, and he pretended that he hadn’t realized. He felt like a dick for that. But he got dressed in blue jeans and a thermal shirt, and went out into the kitchen, where she wasn’t.

She’d made herself scarce, clearly.

There was no coffee in the pot. He wondered if she’d gone ahead for Christmas. Then he looked at the clock. It was eight-thirty in the morning. He never slept that late. He was always up with the sun. And here he’d gone and slept that late on Christmas.

Dammit, this woman was messing him around.

This woman.

Your friend. Your friend, you damn asshole.

Yeah, he was an asshole. He had...

He hadn’t been able to get enough of her last night. He’d stroked her and tasted her and let her come all over him for a good hour before he thrust home. It had been the hottest, most erotic experience of his life.

And everything in him had wanted to crawl into bed with her. But he hadn’t done it. He hadn’t been able to bring himself to do it.

Yeah, you’re perilously close to a whole lot of things you know you’re not allowed to have.

He looked out the window and saw that the space in front of the house was empty.

She had taken the truck.

He got dressed, made himself some coffee and started to walk over to the main ranch house.

The truck was outside the great spread, so he figured she was inside. He walked up the front steps, and knocked on the door.

It was Callie who opened it.

“It’s about time,” she said, appraising him with a cool expression.

“Good morning.”

“Merry Christmas,” she shot back.

Then she took a step out the front door, wrapped her arm around his neck and kissed him. Not a light good-morning kiss. A deep, passionate kiss that made him want to slam that door and take her right back to their cabin, where he could have his way with her again.

“Merry Christmas,” she said even more firmly when they parted.

“What’s gotten into you?”

“Last night?” Her lips twitched. “You did.”

“Cute,” he responded.

“You just looked so peaceful this morning sleeping naked on your bed that I couldn’t bring myself to wake you. Had we been together, it might’ve been a different story. But we weren’t. So, anyway.” Her voice shifted to a singsong he’d never heard from her before. “I hope you don’t mind, the cinnamon rolls have gotten cold.”

“It’s fine,” he said, successfully shamed as he knew she had intended him to be.

She took his hand and dragged him inside. Then led him to the grand living room. The massive Christmas tree was all lit up, the presents underneath it mostly open.

“Merry Christmas,” he said.

“Merry Christmas,” her family said back with varying degrees of humor in their faces.

He was the fool who’d slept through Christmas morning, and he didn’t know how to process all this togetherness and cheer, and he hadn’t had any time to warm up to it.

The deep sleep he’d fallen into had definitely been comatose, and it had most definitely been because the woman had nearly blown his head off.

And he didn’t know how to interact with her brothers and dad now. Hell, he barely knew how to interact with his own family half the time and here he was, feeling like his skin had been peeled back a layer, dealing with family that wasn’t even his.

“We got you a gift,” her mom said, and that stopped him short.

“Oh,” he said. “I’m sorry, I didn’t bring—”

“It’s all right,” her mom said. “We understand that all this came on really suddenly for you. But still.”

They handed him a bottle of whiskey with a red ribbon tied around the neck of it.

“Thanks,” he said.

“We all got the same thing,” Boone said, lifting his bottle up, and he really didn’t quite know how to process that. He didn’t want to. Didn’t want to go over the full implications. Anyway, they didn’t matter. Because he wasn’t actually their son-in-law. Not like they thought.